This research sought to establish the extent of and reasons for community participation and non participation in local decision-making practices in the New Forest National Park, a protected area, in Southern England. Following a critical examination of the literature and previous research the concepts and theories of government, governance and of social capital were identified as being critical for an understanding and explanation of community engagement and disengagement. Primary data was collected through a series of qualitative interviews with representatives of institutions and of the local community in the area together with two concurrent quantitative surveys, one a random household survey and the other of individuals registered on an existing citizen's panel. Unlike studies of participation in society at large, the findings show a high level of participation is occurring. The nature and characteristics of this participation are examined in terms of non participation and three levels of participation categorized as; individual, collective, and leadership. Distinguishing characteristics of these four categories include the respondents' 'level of education', 'length of residence in the area' and their views of their local community. It was also demonstrated that the varying levels of engagement and disengagement can additionally be differentiated by an individual's perception as to their political efficacy and their degree of cynicism towards institutions. These views on governance question the depth and quality of participation occurring in the New Forest and are further related to the systems of engagement identified. This research addresses gaps in previous studies conducted in protected areas in that it focuses upon the range of participation and non participation demonstrated in a western protected area context. The results of this research raise questions as to just how transferable best practices are and how feasible wider community engagement is to achieve in the New Forest or other protected areas where participatory principles are practiced in what are fundamentally centralized governmental systems based on representative democratic regimes. These findings have implications for the design of community engagement strategies and for additional research into community participation. They suggest that if further progress is to be made in understanding community participation in protected areas two challenges need to be confronted, namely agreement on a definition of 'good' governance and on the constituents of wider community engagement which recognise the particular characteristics of the 'protected area' context. Suggestions for future research based on single, comparative and longitudinal case studies in other protected areas are proposed. More specifically research on non and limited participation is particularly encouraged due to the potential such an inquiry holds for informing the design of innovative and effective forms of participation aimed at increasing wider community engagement. Keywords: community participation, local decision-making, characteristics and reasons for engagement and disengagement, social capital, governance, best practice, wider community.

This study highlights the treatment of the smaller stakeholders for whom the social legacy impacts are potentially the greatest within mega-event planning. The aim of this research is to develop a framework of urban regeneration legacy associated with the hosting of mega-events where the local community are key stakeholders, and where they can gain long-term positive social legacies. Mega-events, such as the Olympic Games, are widely held to bring a variety of positive social benefits through the process of urban regeneration. This research is built around the development of a conceptual framework of social legacy impacts arising from the urban regeneration planned through hosting the Olympic Games. Social legacy impacts, also referred to as soft impacts, are those which are intangible and affect individuals within their everyday lives in the longer term. This research is concerned with the social legacy impacts of The London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games on the ‘community’ (being defined as those, who have either lived, worked or have some social connection with the area within the proposed Olympic Park site) in the Lower Lea Valley site in east London, and how they have or have not been recognised as stakeholders. A stakeholder being an individual or group who will be affected by the actions, decisions or policies of the Games organisers, within the planning of the Games. Key informant interviews have been undertaken with individuals who have had a stake in the planning of the Barcelona Games of 1992, Sydney Games of 2000 and the planning of the London 2012 Games. Each interview involved a semi-structured conversation, encouraging the interviewees to recount their experiences of the planning of these mega-events from the perspectives of the communities involved and the social legacy planning. Interviews were analysed thematically. The main themes to emerge focus on legacy identification, community identification, the importance of regeneration for the existing community, the need to identify power relationships and the need for knowledge transfer and experience. The study shows that, for some ‘communities’, the opportunity to gain positive social benefits are too late as they themselves have already been relocated. The study has developed the Olympic Legacy Management Stakeholder framework to help communities to become more active as stakeholders within future mega-event planning through, amongst other things, recognising the different power relationships that exist.